Bosnian Serbs grudgingly
embrace peace plan

November 24, 1995
Web posted at: 10:15 p.m. EST (0315 GMT)

PALE, Bosnia-Herzegovina (CNN) -- Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic objected to provisions of the Bosnian peace agreement Friday, but said it was time to stop the military struggle and to fight by political means instead.

Karadzic and Bosnian Serb Parliament Speaker Momcilo Krajisnik appeared on Bosnian Serb television Friday night to explain both their objections to the deal and their willingness to accept it.

"So we got something and we lost something."

-- Radovan Karadzic

Karadzic said his government achieved most of its goals. He said that while his government has not been recognized as a state, it is now internationally recognized as a Serbian republic inside Bosnia.

"In that respect, we can say that we have achieved our goal," Karadzic said. "We have half of Bosnia, more than 40 cities in Bosnia. We also have good land in each region, but in some regions we didn't get some."

"So we got something and we lost something," he said.

Karadzic said the Bosnian Serbs are not pleased about having to give up their claims to sections of northwest Bosnia and the city of Sarajevo.

He suggested the Bosnian government gained from favoritism shown by the main sponsor of the peace talks in Dayton, the United States.

"I can say the Americans did a lot for the Muslims," Karadzic told viewers. "From the beginning of the war, they kept saving them from total defeat. And finally, they took their side and helped them draft a map so it would be toward the benefit of their side."

Karadzic foresees problems in a unified Sarajevo controlled exclusively by the Bosnian government.

"The international community believe that they saved a problem by preserving the unity of the city, but they made the problem even bigger," he said. "I think it would be a lesser problem if they had given a part of the city to Muslims and another part to Serbs, because there are 150,000 Serbs who would never leave their homes.

"The international community will have to protect them for another five years, at least."

Speaker Krajisnik complained that during the peace negotiations, the Bosnian Serbs were overruled and often ignored by their representative, Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic.